{"id":11973,"date":"2015-08-09T17:04:38","date_gmt":"2015-08-09T21:04:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=11973"},"modified":"2015-08-09T17:11:45","modified_gmt":"2015-08-09T21:11:45","slug":"the-hunt-and-the-shunt-brian-yuznas-society-1989","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=11973","title":{"rendered":"The Hunt and the Shunt: Brian Yuzna&#8217;s Society (1989)"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_11991\" style=\"width: 410px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_Devasquez.jpg\"><img aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-11991\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11991\" alt=\"Society_Devasquez\" src=\"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_Devasquez.jpg\" width=\"400\" height=\"272\" srcset=\"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_Devasquez.jpg 400w, https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_Devasquez-300x204.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-11991\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Something is not&#8230; quite&#8230; right&#8230;<\/p><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Although Brian Yuzna\u2019s directorial debut was well-received in Britain, its brief North American release and negative reviews from the trades pretty much ensured a fast path to home video and cable TV, where after it evolved into a cult film, mostly because of its steady tone of paranoia, and a finale involving something called shunting.<\/p>\n<p>I remember a friend describing the orgiastic sequence as \u2018something else\u2019 \u2013 which it is \u2013 but over 25 years later Screaming Mad George\u2019s practical effects are still shocking and amazing. It\u2019s kind of dismissive to brand it as \u2018old school\u2019 effects because there\u2019s much vividness in the full-scale monstrosities that were realized with makeup, prosthetics, slime, and the actors reacting not to green screen nothingness but colleagues in character slurping, tearing, and yanking victims into elastic human matter.<\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=11972\">Society<\/a><\/strong> (1989) is supposedly about a teen discovering the suspicions of his lineage may well be false, and that something\u2019s very, <em>very<\/em>\u00a0wrong with both his family and friends in an elite Beverly Hills zip code. The script feels undercooked, but that vagueness sometimes works in the film&#8217;s favour, keeping the paranoia and the source of young Billy\u2019s fears murky yet persistent, and Yuzna\u00a0 certainly sets the tone with a great Main Title sequence set to a variant of the classic Eton ode with new lyrics sung quite eerily by a soprano.<\/p>\n<p>Arrow Video\u2019s first Blu-ray release is a limited edition, sporting gatefold design and a comic book, and hopefully this is the first of several Yuzna special editions, showcasing the genius collaborations between the director and effects whiz Screaming Mad George.<\/p>\n<p><em>Coming next:<\/em> soundtrack reviews.<\/p>\n<p>Right below: the many faces of\u00a0<strong>Society<\/strong>:<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_poster3.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11982 aligncenter\" alt=\"Society_poster3\" src=\"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_poster3.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"438\" srcset=\"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_poster3.jpg 300w, https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_poster3-205x300.jpg 205w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_poster1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11980 aligncenter\" alt=\"Society_poster1\" src=\"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_poster1.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"392\" srcset=\"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_poster1.jpg 300w, https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_poster1-230x300.jpg 230w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_poster2.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-11981\" alt=\"Society_poster2\" src=\"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_poster2.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"427\" srcset=\"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_poster2.jpg 300w, https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_poster2-211x300.jpg 211w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_R2_BR.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-11983\" alt=\"Society_R2_BR\" src=\"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_R2_BR.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"409\" srcset=\"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_R2_BR.jpg 300w, https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_R2_BR-220x300.jpg 220w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Cheers,<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Mark R. Hasan<\/strong>, Editor<br \/>\n<strong>KQEK.com<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Review of Brian Yuzna&#8217;s supreme cult film Society (1989), new on Blu in a sexy special limited edition from Arrow Video \/ MVD Visual.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11979,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[6],"tags":[3853,2562,2563,3854,3852],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Society_featured.jpg","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8nuyW-377","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11973"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11973"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11973\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11994,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11973\/revisions\/11994"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11979"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11973"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11973"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11973"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}